urbanMSP

The city is in the middle of an apartment boom, but that site isn’t the ideal location for residential

It would actually be great to mix in some residential over there, but I guess I know what they mean.

The site looks odd because of the ridiculously bad developments surrounding it. The 80s were an ugly time of lifeless mega-blocks. It should go the direction of the 4marq block, but sounds like the owners are still willing to hold out. The Oakland should be moved over the S. Nicollet. I'm sure there's a crappy parking lot that could be filled in.

Yeah, at this point the Oakland is just a really gorgeous facade attached to an apartment building that was probably already gutted out even before the fire.

Isn't the Oakland narrow enough where you could build a tower complex around it, save the facade, and not have significant structural complexity here? It's not like building the Citigroup Tower over a church or something.

Scalping a facade would be the preferred last option, right behind demolition of course. The building is so out of context now, maybe moving it up the street towards Elliot Park.

If it's moved, it should be to the historic district a few blocks SE. Maybe the parking lot at 9th & Park.

I like that it's out of context and hope it stays put--a good reminder of downtown's residential history.

We're not talking about moving a stick-framed house, though. Moving a structure like this would be a massive undertaking, and I'm not sure the results would be any more historically beneficial than just saving the facade and reattaching it a newly built apartment building somewhere in EP.

I realize some have said this block wouldn't be ideal for residential... But I feel like 9th and/or 10th actually has promise to become more of a human-scale street across downtown. Both of these streets are your standard 3+ lane one-way, but they aren't primary freeway connectors on either end. Especially 9th St, which dead ends on both sides of town.

Yes, the protected bike lane is a noticable improvement. But there's still plenty of room for streetscape improvements. Imagine if we truly prioritized 9th St as a bike/walk corridor. Calm two-way traffic, new bumpouts and space for a shade tree canopy to develop. Think how pleasant that public realm would be, and how it would invite investment in adjacent properties. We're already seeing it with KA. Other opportunities include Normandy Inn's lot, rewrapping the Mpls Energy Center, a few smaller parking lots, and of course this block of parking. It already serves the heart of Elliot Park's historic district.

Then we could stripe a contraflow westbound transit lane on 10th St for the (few few) buses that use 9th.

Sample 9th St: http://streetmix.net/-/436912
Sample 10th St: http://streetmix.net/-/436923

I have had feelings that in the way that 4th in St. Paul could have a fantastic life as a walkable car-free street, I could see 9th through Minneapolis serving the same. 4th in St. Paul terminates at both ends and doesn't extend out of downtown. 9th is almost the same in Minneapolis as it starts at the park on the east and practically ends at 1st Ave on the other.

If the city gets around to making 10th, 11th, 12th as two-ways, 9th could have a good life as a pedestrian street running perpendicular to Nicollet.

I don't even think it has to be car-free to be a pedestrian street. It could still be a relatively narrow one or two lane street (two way if two lane) with on-street parking and loading for short-term vehicular access to adjacent properties.

It could be a street designed for people but accommodating cars, to replace today's 9th St which is designed for cars but accommodates people.

I propose Matt's plan with the possibility of converting to Eric's over time.

no one-way street is ever going to be the kind of human-scale commercial environment we'd deserve. Converting to two-way traffic is step #1 before we get carried away here.

The city has been fiddling around with some variation of these idea for almost a decade, right? Trying to get buy-off from the Downtown Council and probably waiting for its slot to come up for full reconstruction.

EDIT: The Access Minneapolis Plan, issued in 2007 (Executive Summary PDF here) actually proposed that 8th Street become the pedestrian street, but I'd tend to agree that 9th makes more sense.

The three-alarm fire at the Oakland Apartments was reportedly caused by a faulty electrical outlet:

http://www.startribune.com/minneapolis- ... 397169021/

Faulty outlet

http://m.startribune.com/minneapolis-fi ... tion=local

Hey this is neat: https://www.facebook.com/pg/oaklandson9 ... e_internal

Someone is rehabbing the building and sharing the experience on Facebook. In a post today they state that it will cost close to $3MM to rehab, and go on to say that that figure is close to double what the building is worth as a 24-unit apartment building.

But I think they may be basing that on the building's current tax value (~$1.2MM prior to the fire) rather than if it was sold today as a fully rehabbed building. It's not unusual for newer luxury apartment buildings in Uptown / North Loop to sell for over 300k/unit, ranging down to the low-100s for older apartments in need of repair or in less-desirable locations. Even at 175k-200k per unit (probably low for downtown, even if amenity-less), the 24-unit building could sell for $4-5MM.

Cool!

Fantastic! This should be fascinating to follow.

Oh please, tear it down. Free up that block so something nice can be built.